You need to remember that in
the end of chapter 9, there is an account of our Lord coming
into the world, in the end of the world, that he might die
to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. And that he was once
offered, verse 28, to bear the sins of many, and unto them that
look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto
salvation. Now with that description of
our Lord's mission and incarnation, let's begin our reading in verse
5. He came in the end of the world,
or literally, of the ages. And verse 5, Wherefore, when
he cometh into the world, he said, Sacrifice an offering thou
would not, but a body hast thou prepared me. In burnt offerings
and sacrifices for sin thou hast had no pleasure. Then said I,
Lo, I come, in the volume of the book it is written of me,
to do thy will, O God, Above, when He said, Sacrifice and offering,
and burnt offering, and offering for sin thou wouldest not, neither
had pleasure therein which are offered by the law. Then said
he, Lo, I come to do thy will, O God. He takes away the first,
that he may establish the second, by the which will we are sanctified
through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once. And every priest standeth daily
ministering and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices which can
never take away sin. But this man, after he had offered
one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down on the right hand of
God, from henceforth expecting till his enemies be made his
footstool. For by one offering he has perfected
forever them that are sanctified. Now, I challenge you to find
a more God, Christ-honoring, glorifying passage of Scripture
in the New Testament. Let's review just a minute or
two before we get our feet out into this deep water. In an earlier
study, last week in fact, in verses 1 through 4, we saw the
apostle there proving the inability of those animal sacrifices offered
under the old economy to take away sin. And he said that they
were shadows of good things to come, but that they were not
the very image of the things themselves. And though they were
often repeated, they were some of them daily, some of them seasonally,
some of them yearly, and they were repeated, yet they could
not perfect the worshiper. They could not purge sin and
its conviction off of their consciences. And rather than allowing them
to forget their sin, It brought sin to remembrance again every
year by the repetition of those Old Testament sacrifices. And then in verse 4, I think
he deals a very death blow to the sacrifices offered under
the law saying that it is impossible. They cannot, they did not, they
would not nor they cannot take away sin. They cannot provide
the greatest need that sinful men and women have and that is
to take away sin, to lift it off of those that were the worshippers
and put it away and free the worshipper of the guilt and the
conscience of sin. And though there were many of
those sacrifices made, yet they could not perfect the worshipper
in the sight of God. And then, near the end of our
first study, we noted or brought up a matter. And that is that
what is written here is sure to raise a question and an objection
from the Jewish standpoint. A Jew, when hearing these things,
would surely raise a question and would object. This would
bring a very strong reaction from a present, I mean then,
practitioner of Judaism when presented the message of Christianity
and preached the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. And we can
say that they almost certainly would throw the challenge flag
with regard to what is written here and what is preached in
the gospel. Now, the question or the objection
would be along this line. Why then were they instituted
in the first place? Why were they ever put into place? Why did God require them and
require them strictly? Now, the objection to Christianity,
therefore, by a carnal Jew would be something after this manner
or something after this sort. The Jew would look at Christianity,
I'm talking about the first century Jew, that Jew would look at Christianity,
especially if he was an unbeliever, and he would say to the minister
and to the people practicing Christianity, You don't have
a high priest. You have no temple for that priest
to minister in. You have no sacrifice. You have
no observance of the Sabbath day. Yet all of these things
we have as Christians in connection with our Lord Jesus Christ. Let's address the question and
the complaint of the first century Jews, those that lived and those
that heard Christ and the Apostle. Some of them were exposed unto
the Gospel, to the preaching of Christ crucified as the only
way of sin and redemption. Now, upon hearing what is contained
in Hebrews 10, verses 1 through 4, especially in the fourth verse,
the question would be something like this as we said. Why then
were they ever instituted or why were they ever given in the
first place? And again, why after all this
time? Our fathers worshipped in this
manner for centuries. Why after all of this time? And they might plead such text
in their favor as Leviticus chapter 17 and verse 11 for one. I have given the blood to you
upon the altar to make an atonement for your soul. The blood makes
an atonement for your soul. And how often was the blood sprinkled
upon the mercy seat by the high priest in the tabernacle in the
wilderness as a day of atonement. Now, to answer that question
and get a better parallel grasp of it, let me suggest that there
is a similar, very much like it, situation to be found in
Galatian, the third chapter in the New Testament concerning
the question, why then were such sacrifices instituted if they
could not take away sin, if they could not purge the conscience,
and if they could not perfect the worshipers? Now, I beg you
to bear with me for a short digression here in this claim, turning to
Galatians chapter 3, if you desire, or whether or not. Now, in Galatians
chapter 3, Paul has written that the law as concerning the law
in verses 1 through 9, chapter 3, that the Spirit was given
unto them, not in conjunction with the law, but in conjunction
with faith, in conjunction with the gospel. The Spirit was bestowed
upon them, not in conjunction with the law. Then in verse 10
of that chapter, They that are under the law are under the curse
of the law. In verse 11, no one is justified
by the law in the sight of God. And then verse 13, Christ has
redeemed us from the curse of the law being made a curse for
us. Then in verse 14 through verse
18, he shows that the promise of God to Abraham, that he would
be the father of many and that they would share in the inherent,
the promise of God to Abraham was given prior, before the giving
of the law. And he also goes to make the
point that the giving or the coming of the law did not alter
and it did not disannul the promise that had been made unto Abraham,
and it had no effect or diminishing upon the inheritor. Then in Galatians 3 and 19, and
here's my point, the reaction that Paul anticipates is coming
from what he has written and said. Well, if the law cannot
justify and it cannot make one righteous, and if the inheritance
is by promise through faith and not by the law, what then is
the purpose of the law? Chapter 3 and verse 19. Why was it given? And in Galatians
Paul tells them It was given. It came in alongside of the promise
because of transgression. That's Paul's answer. And he
likens it to a stern pedagogue whose function or office was
to take a young child and prepare that young child to become an
heir or prepare him for adulthood. So the question could be raised
after Hebrews 10, 1 through 4. If the sacrifices of the law
could not take away sin, why were they given Why were they
required? What good were they after all
of this time? And what purpose did they serve
if they could not make a worshipper perfect? And we've already seen
in verse 1 in our last study, they were a shadow of good things
to come. And in Galatians 3, the end of
it, and the first part of chapter 4, Paul sets forth two valuable
functions of the law in relation to the Abrahamic covenant. Number
one, it was added because of transgression. Galatians 3 and
19. And remember Hebrews 10 and verse
3, in those sacrificed a remembrance of sin is made every year. And what about Romans 5 and verse
20 where Paul writes, the law entered that the offense, that
is, the sin of Adam might abound. The law entered that the offense
might abound. By the law, sin becomes exceedingly
sinful, Paul said in Romans chapter 7. But the second function of
it, Paul, in Galatians 3, verse 23, down through chapter 4 and
verse 7, there portrays for his Jewish readers and their understanding
the law under the figure of a pedagogue, or literally, a child trainer
is what the word pedagogue means. John Eady wrote this, and I'm
quoting, the mosaic dispensation was introduced between the Abrahamic
promise and the coming of the promised seed as a preparative
or an educational instrument foreshadowing the reality of
pardon and atonement as preparatory to the appearance of the great
Deliverer." And that is the understanding and the explanation of Paul for
why the law was given since it could not do many things. Remember
what Paul said in Romans 8? I think it's verse 3. What the
law could not do is made up in Jesus Christ. Now, such things
as the sacrifices were a shadow, Hebrews 10 and verse 1, a shadow
of things to come. As Paul said again in Colossians
chapter 2 and verse 17, they were not the end in themselves,
nor were they to remain in force forever. They were not a permanent
institution. Now, coming to our text at last,
Hebrews 10, verse 5 and following, of Hebrews 10, where the apostle
now speaks to them of the incarnation of Christ and of the efficacy
of the one death or the one sacrifice. And this brings us to an interesting,
as well as a most important, passage of Scripture and its
relevance to the subject that is at hand. A passage of Scripture
is quoted by the Hebrew author from the Old Testament. And in
your cross-reference you notice that it is Psalm 40 and verses
6 through 8. And the apostle cites these words
from the psalmist for a purpose. And that is to confirm what he
had just said about the inefficiency of the Old Testament sacrifices
could take away sin, they could not take away sin, and therefore
they were not a permanent fixture. By the way, for whatever it might
prove to be worth, in studying from the Hebrew epistle, one
must come to the realization that the study of Hebrew, which
the subject is, the excellency of Christ over all the revered
institutions of the old economy. We notice that proof of this
is so often gathered from the Old Testament Scripture themselves,
that he shows the excellency of Christ over all else by the
Old Testament Scripture. These things were principally
written, therefore, to those who professed the Old Testament
oracle to be inspired and canonical and irreverent. in error, that
is, without any kind of error. And in Psalm 40, verse 6 through
8, where Spurgeon wrote, and I'm quoting, a passage in which
the incarnate Christ is seen through a glass darkly, unquote,
that Psalm. For the Hebrew penman in our
text today applies this passage from Psalm 40 to the incarnation
of Christ. And he shows that the sacrifice
of Christ is the very image of the good things that were to
come, of which legal sacrifice were only a shadow. So see the opening word in verse
5. Wherefore, it sets forth the
purpose of God, how He by His very own Son, because of the
inability of the Old Testament sacrifices to remove sin, prepared
Him a body by which He would offer an effectual atonement
and sacrifice for sin when He comes into the world. entering
in or coming into the world, which is first and foremost His
incarnation and manifestation among men in the world. Now, let's read that passage
in Psalms chapter 40. If you want to turn there, I'm
going to read in the 40th Psalm and verses 6 through 8 for our
use and consideration. Psalm chapter 40 and verse 6
through verse 8 says this. We'll notice that it is not a
verbatim, that is a word for word quotation in Hebrew, but
here we have it. Sacrifice and offering thou didst
not desire. Mine ears hast thou opened, burnt
offering and sin offering hast thou not required. Then said
I, Lo, I come, in the volume of the book it is written of
me. I delight to do thy will, O God,
yea, thy law is within my heart." Now in Hebrews 10, 5-7, again
you'll notice, not a word-for-word quotation. For example, Psalm
40 and verse 6 reads, When ears hast thou opened, the margin
hath it as did, and some think that it refers to the boring
of the ear of a slave who refused his liberty and his freedom in
Exodus 21 and verse 6 and became a perpetual servant. But Hebrews
10 and 5 has it, a body hast thou prepared me. In the margin
here, has fitted me. A body hast thou fitted for me. There is a contrast there in
verse 5. sacrifices and offerings you
would not but a body thou has prepared or has fitted me." Now,
always surprised to hear these words attributed to Messiah,
for inspiration puts these words in the mouth of Messiah. Verse 5, sacrifice and offerings
you would not. Psalm 40 and 6 said, not desire,
not require. Hebrews 10 and verse 6, in such
offerings you had no pleasure or not well pleased. John Brown gave a sort of a paraphrase
of the prophecy of Psalm 40 that is cited here in Hebrews 10. That Messiah, in an ancient oracle
that pertained to His incarnation, uses the very words quoted from
Psalms chapter 40, "...sacrifices and offerings you desired not,
but a body you fitted me. In those sacrifices you took
no pleasure. Lo, I come to do thy will, O
God." Now I think here we best be careful in dealing with statements
declaring God's dissatisfaction with the sacrifices. For this
is done in Scripture in a twofold way." In other words, God speaks
of His displeasure with the Old Testament sacrifices in a twofold
way and sin in the Scripture. As far as Calvin noted, the Old
Testament Scripture in places, in the prophets, do speak of
sacrifices that do not please God, which He will not accept,
and even on occasion calling them an abomination." Now, I'm
turning to Isaiah chapter 1. If you want to turn, okay. If
you want to listen, fine. But in Isaiah chapter 1, perhaps
we have the greatest example of that to be found anywhere
in the Scripture. Very strong passage along that
line. And in Isaiah 1, let's read verses
10 through verse 15. Hear ye the word of the Lord,
ye rulers of Sodom. Give ear unto the law of our
God, ye people of Gomorrah. To what purpose is the multitude
of your sacrifices unto me, saith the Lord? I am full of burnt
offerings, of ram, and the fat of fed beast, and I delight not
in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of he goats. When ye come to appear before
me, who hath required this at your hand, to tread my courts? Bring no more vain oblation. Incense is an abomination unto
me. The new moons and the Sabbath,
the calling of assemblies, I cannot away with. It is iniquity, even
the solemn meeting. Your new moons and your appointed
feasts, My soul hates. They are a trouble unto me. I
am weary of them. When you spread forth your hand,
I will hide mine eyes from you. Yea, when you make many prayers,
I will not hear. Your hands are full of blood. Now there are some statements
here to single out for emphasis and for our consideration, such
as verse 11. I am full burnt offerings I delight
not in the blood of bullocks and lambs and goats. Look at
verse 13. Incense is an abomination. Verse 14. Your new moon's an
appointed feast my soul hates. And yet, God it was that had
appointed and instituted these things, so how then and why does
Jehovah so strongly condemn them and their offerers on this occasion? Well, the answer is easy. The
answer is simple. The answer is not the sacrifices
and the institution themselves or the objects of Jehovah's scorn,
but the evil, hypocritical, unrepentant, godless persons and the way that
they offered them in their time and in their life. which is shown
by the context in Isaiah chapter 1. And what Owen called, quote,
the gross hypocrisy of the people in that generation. Their incurable
wickedness. And you have it written up in
Isaiah 1, 5 through 9. You should look at that as a
prelude to God speaking of the sacrifices. What had they done? What had the people done? They
had put the outward ritual above the inward delight in the ordinances
of their God. They were not contrite and repentant. In fact, they were evildoers. They went throughout the motion. I mean, they went through outward
motions only. They did only them mechanically
and outwardly and kept up their wicked ways at one and the same
time. It did not turn them from their
evil. They did not give up their idolatry. They went through the rituals
and the ceremonies of the Mosaic law and yet clung to their wicked,
unrepentant, hypocritical and abominable ways. Just as many
do today in the churches who say the Creed or take off communion
They sing loud, they kneel, they bow, they make the sign of the
cross, and many like such things they do, and then go right on
right back into their wickedness without repentance at all. Now, I didn't mean to stretch
this point out this far, but consider a couple more examples
from the Old Testament. In Psalm 51, David's great repentant
prayer, verse 16 and verse 17, when David had been convicted
and God had granted David repentance, He said this, For thou desirest
not sacrifice, else would I give it. Thou delightest not in burnt
offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken
spirit, a broken and a contrite heart, O God, Thou wilt not despise. It was not for David, after his
great sin, to run to the altar and slay many beasts, but for
David to have a repentant heart cleansed of its sin and of its
wickedness. One more example. You remember
when King Saul sought to justify his disobedience to God when
he was sent upon a mission, you have it in 1 Samuel 15, verse
22. And he comes back, not as God
had commanded him, And the prophet Samuel comes to him and rebukes
him for his sin. You remember what Saul said? Oh, I kept the best for sacrifice
unto the Lord. And Saul, I mean Samuel, the
prophet's answer was this. Hath the Lord delight in burnt
offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? And he closed it with it, to
obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the Fat Abraham. But as Calvin wrote on our text
in Hebrews 10, the reasoning here is different in Hebrews
10. And we need to look in that as
in verse 6, the reason for God not having pleasure in burnt
offerings and sacrifices for sin is not traced to the hypocrisy
and the wickedness of the offerer, but to the fact that they could
not take away sin, nor are they condemned as being the invention
of men. For verse 8, they were offered
according to the law. They were ineffectual to the
taking away of sin and guilt and bestowing salvation on those
who worshipped by their use. And as Brown put it, They could
not satisfy justice so as to lay a foundation for the honorable
exercise of mercy." Those animal sacrifices could not. And if
any still object, Why then were they instituted in the first
place? We hearken back to verse 1, chapter
10 of Hebrew. They are a shadow of things to
come. They portrayed in a sketchy outline
those things that were to come. Now, let's pursue this, quote,
no pleasure, unquote, in the sacrifices of the law. As Owen the Puritan wrote, the
focus here in Hebrews, in this place, is not upon their abuse
of the sacrifices by the people. He does not, as in Isaiah chapter
1, speak of the behavior or the misconduct or the misuse of the
people in the sacrifices, but He speaks directly of the sacrifices
themselves. In Isaiah 1, He speaks to the
people who offer the sacrifices. In Hebrews 10, he speaks of the
use of the sacrifices directly. They were not ceased on account
of the hypocrisy of the users or the wickedness of the users,
else had they ceased long ago, if that be the cause. And the
most recent focus or emphasis here in Hebrews chapter 10 has
been the impotency of the sacrifices of the law to take away sin which
is done by the death of Christ. Now there's something else here
to notice in our passage, that being the three-fold mention
of the will of God in our text today. Verse 7, Messiah says,
I come to do thy will, O God." In verse 9, you have it again. In verse 12, we read, "...by
which will." Now, a wonderful thing is accomplished by this
will of God. Since the sacrifices of the law
could not take away sin, God was pleased to provide one who
could put away sin, and this according to the will of God. And it required the incarnation
of the Son Eternal, that He be fitted with a suitable body under
the accomplishing of the will of God to make a sacrifice that
would put away sin. And the Son assumed a body yet
without depravity, in union with his divine nature. He was one
person with two natures. He was the God-man, God and man,
that he might mediate between God and men, and that he might
give himself as a suitable sacrifice to God for sin. God not being
pleased with the lost sacrifices as a proper recompense for our
sin. The Son pledges to do the will
of God, I come to do Thy will, O God. See also in verse 9, the
application of the prophecy from Psalm chapter 40. that in view
of all that has been said, the death of Messiah put an end to
the Levitical sacrifices. He takes away the first that
he may establish the second. And a quick point, this ancient
prophecy and others like it mostly passed over the head of most
of the Jew who heard and studied the Scripture. It was a clear
testimony in their Old Testament Scripture concerning the weakness
of the sacrifices and the promise of a better one to be provided
and to come. And yet only a few spiritual
minded Jews ever caught on. Coming now to verses 10 through
14 in our text. He came to do the will of God.
Now we see that it was the will of God that the incarnate Christ
offer Himself as the perfect sacrifice for sin. Now we see
the end for which God fitted Him a body. that by the offering
of that body as a sacrifice for sin had a sanctifying power. And this word sanctified here
is not to be limited to personal morality in the individual, but
it includes all that the law sacrifices could not do. Yes, it set them apart from the
herd of mankind, and did so by taking away their sin. And it
fully and it freely justified forever those that Christ died
for. It accomplished what all slain
beasts accumulated could not do, purify the heart, purge the
conscience, fully concentrate the redeemed one to the worship
and the service of God. If you will pardon a step back,
but the lost sacrifices, the blood of bulls and of goats and
the ashes of a heifer were limited in their sanctifying ability
compared to the blood of Christ. Now take time to read it, but
in Hebrews 9, 13 and 14 you will find that comparison. Such sacrifices
only removed ceremonial defilement in a typical manner, a shadow,
but in an external way, I should have said, and they did not,
as Gil wrote, they did not really sanctify the heart or purge or
cleanse the soul of those worshipers from sin. while in Hebrews 9
and verse 14, the blood of Christ does purge the conscience from
dead works to serve the living God. Now, a closing point and
a contrast between the two types of sacrifices which in multiple
times mentioned in the Hebrew epistle. Reading Hebrews, I hope
you catch on to this. Number one, The many, many sacrifices
of the Levitical kind. Yearly, daily, so on. Number two, the one sacrifice
of Christ. Here's the contrast. Many, many
animal sacrifices. Christ's one sacrifice. Yet those lost sacrifices, though
done daily, and oftentimes, in verse 11, can never take away
sin. Yea, it was impossible that they
should, even if done daily or done yearly. Yet all of them
together could not take away one sin. On the other hand, the
one and only death of Christ. Number one, it put away sin. Number two, it put away every
sin of every person that Christ died for, that God made our sin
to light upon Him. Isaiah 53 and verse 6. Number three, it put it away
forever. It put away sin. It put away
every sin that Christ died for. and it put it away forever. Not only will it never need repeating,
but nothing can be added to it. Nothing need be brought in alongside
of the sacrifice of Christ to make it effective. The weakness
of the legal sacrifices was in their inability to take away
sin, though they were offered up again and again and again. And the strength of the sacrifice
of Christ was in the fact that it put away sin forever. It saved forever. Christ died
once. Once and no more. Once and never
again. See again in the 10th verse,
the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once. In verse 14 of our
text, by one offering. Hebrews 9.26, once. in the end of the world." Hebrews
9.28, Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many. Hebrews 9.12, He entered once
into the holy place. Hebrews 7.27, once He offered
up Himself. As Paul writes in Romans 6 and
verse 10, in that He died. He died unto sin once. 1 Peter
3, verse 18, Christ has once suffered for sin, the just for
the unjudged. There is a statement in Hebrews
9, verse 27. You may look at it. You have
heard it quoted. You have probably quoted it yourself. You have probably heard a sermon
on it. You might have heard it used
as a funeral text. It says this, it is appointed
unto man once to die and after this the judgment. Now this is
a general and accepted truth. Born once into the world, live
one life, and die one death. It is a part of the penalty of
sin imposed upon Adam and the human family. Men don't die multiple
deaths because they're born, lived and die a sinner. They
only die one time, no matter how wicked and vile and ungodly
they are. And the apostle uses this as
proof that the one death of Christ is a proper and a complete undergoing
of the penalty of sin. If you look at Hebrews 9, verse
27, 28, we will see there the little words, as. As, in verse
27. As it is appointed. So, in verse
28. And as. So Christ was once offered. Now, you're thinking ahead of
me. Such cases as Enoch and Elijah, who did not die at all, and Lazarus,
who died at least two times, are exceptions of the common
law, rule, and arrangement. Christ need not offer Himself
often, not even as soon as man fell. But in the end of the ages
and at the appointed time, and only His death could usher in
the new and the better covenant. Only His death brought an end
to the law of sacrifice, and His one death reached back and
it saved Noah and Abraham and Moses and David, as well as it
saved Peter and Paul and John and all men and all women. who are ever saved, whether under
the old economy or the new economy. No other sacrifice will take
away sin. And it has an everlasting efficacy
to save forever, to save to the uttermost, to save fully, to
save completely and entirely the sacrifice of Christ by dying
one day. Thank God for that truth as it
is laid out in this place.